Purpose

Measures on the ground provide vital support for any political process. Improving Palestinian living conditions helps create a benign context for negotiations.

In Gaza, building peace from the bottom up includes infrastructure, water, electricity and housing; and on the West Bank, freedom of movement, and development in parts of Area C. Advancement and improvement in these areas helps to improve lives and create a benign context for negotiations.

The opportunity of a regional process and a new relationship between Israel and the Arab world will only be possible if Israel takes action to ease conditions on the ground in the Occupied Territory, helping to generate genuine political momentum towards a two-state solution.

We work with the sides on bold measures that will make a real difference to the daily lives of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, and support a political process.

We work with the sides on bold measures that will make a real difference to the daily lives of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.

However, there is no “economic peace” separate from a political solution. When the politics are moving forward as for example in 2007-2010, the economy responds with higher growth; when the politics stall, as it has since the breakdown of negotiations in 2011, the economy also stalls.

Through a step-by-step approach, where over time we build confidence that the goal of a Palestinian state can and will be attained, we can support an organic evolution towards statehood.

Through our work, we identify and map various scenarios that would enable increased and more effective Palestinian governance in the West Bank, including Area C. We also focus on ways to improve implementation of existing agreements between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, including the Paris Protocol which governs economic relations. Enhancing PA governance, in the interim period, requires the parties to implement better existing agreements, and renew PA jurisdiction over civil issues, as well as the work of the joint committees and coordination mechanisms between the parties.

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